the bleak December...

I'll try to put on a happy face and enjoy all the holiday cheer this month, but deep down inside I'm not feeling a whole lot of cheer.  I'm feeling a kind of deep sadness I can't even put into words, the kind of sadness one would feel in mourning I guess.  Maybe not for a person but definitely for the loss of a dream or hopes or a relationship.   And maybe when I say what it is that has me so down you will just roll your eyes at my small petty problems.  And that is fair.  I do realize while I am throwing this pity party, how lucky I am in SO SO many ways and how my problems are few and trite.  But to me at this moment on this cold winter day this feels like a blow that I can't catch my breath from.

Will just got his shift assignment for next year and he has been assigned to nights....for the 2nd year in a row.  So here's to another 12 months of trying (and failing ) to keeping the kids quiet every morning before school and EVERY SINGLE WEEKEND FOR THE WHOLE DAY, even on Will's weekends off (until 3pm anyway) and THE ENTIRE SUMMER!  Here's to another entire year of sleeping alone and going places with the kids alone.  Here's to other entire year of watching the constant switching back and forth from a days to nights schedule to accommodate trainings and family life, which I can see evidence has already taken a toll.  Here's to another year of little to no quality alone time.    Here's to another year with little to no days as a whole family.

I just feel like we've made it work and done it for a whole year but a lot of what has been keeping me going at the end here was knowing that the year was almost up. Now I'm looking at the calendar facing another 12 long months and right at this very moment it feels like it will be cold and dark winter for all 12 of them. 

It's a season like any other, it'll pass.  the sunshine will return.....eventually right?  He couldn't get assigned 3 years of nights?  could he?  But why do I have any reason to think the next year will be any different.  I've already subconsciously pinned all my hopes on 2020 but why?  Why do I have any reason to?  And maybe that is part of the deep down sadness is that there is no reason to hope or dream, at least not about shift assignments.....not now.....not ever.

I'll get over it in time. I'll have my pity party, do my sulking, then put on my big girl pants, suck it up, put a smile on my face, and move on.  We are all healthy, and provided for and safe, I'm home and can be there for the kids, we'll make the most of the time we have, my problems are small I know that....